Archive for the ‘competition’ Category

Disappointment, necessarily, was the first reaction of *Santa*, for he loves to surprise and delight and so he felt a little put out of a job. But a little reflection soon reassured him that children write to him through the chimneys (a bad idea for him, though a great one for parents etc) and adults parade their wishes to partners, friends, relatives, (some even shovel them into their own childrens’ minds) – and that’s fine for the non-magical christmas that most people enjoy (or despise).

Disappointed *Santa*

*Santa*, however, is a specific variant of the ‘Father Christmas‘ symbolism. He is magical. He has certain very vital corporeal needs in order to operate his work, and certain quite unusual powers enabling him to ‘make dreams come true’ in a way that most people simply don’t expect to occur at all.

Thus it was a slight shame that no-one entered the competition despite one of them being explicitly invited to do so, because now, Zoe, your long yearned for dream holiday lies in your own hands and can only come true if you create its manifestation for yourself. It shouldn’t prove much of a problem in truth; obviously, had you entered the competition it would have been a dream holiday laid on without a hitch or worry but = hey, Rome will still be there next year… 😉

Meanwhile we will now announce *Santa*s gifting for this uncompeted competition:-

Julia will take a trip to Paris in the summer of 2014. She exemplifies the virtues of determination, courage and fellowship.

Paris Chilling

Mr Glenn Miranda will drive a mini-bus to a conference venue on a voluntary basis during the summer of 2014. He exemplifies the virtues of determination, perseverance and humility.

Decorated, but not this particular one 😉

and

Isabella Jakeman will enjoy a very, very, special 10th Birthday. She exemplifies the virtues of faith – and faith is all any of us need.

Cinderella goes to the Ball: (we don’t do pumkin magic, bella 😉 )

Finally, we shall be delivering a christmas wish to Jamie, who lives somewhere in Redditch. He risked his life to save his 6 year old sister on 24th July, 2013 and this is merely one of many symptoms of the fine and noble character of this 12 year old boy. He will probably need to see this post and contact Janie to ensure that his wish is relevant, pleasing and in fact, life changing.

It’s an unexpected, yet particularly fulfilling turn out for both *Santa* and Baboushka (who has been very busy with her home this christmas): a unified response to wishes has been created from a delightful absence of demand, and thus they have been able to listen to that small still voice within that speaks from and for faithfulness of being and honor of action.

So – we’re well into advent and children world wide are posting their letters to *Santa* once again.

Festive Spirits – *Santa* in disguise

We at MissionMiraculus are unofficial agents for *Santa* . We act on *Santa*s behalf without even *Santa* being aware of it, though we do intend to correct this anomaly at the earliest opportunity.

This year we have a particular focus. We are delivering a wish come true to one or two of you.

So first of all we need to hear from you about your dearest wish.

We operate by strict adherence to the promises of *Santa* , by reading every letter or email, by listening carefully to what we hear, by planning a response that optimises satisfaction, and then by planning out methods of procuring the ‘wish come true’ factor, before delivering the ‘gift’.

Our methods are not strictly conventional. Our deliveries are putatively satisfactory at least for all of our target individuals.

We would urge you to take advantage of this service.

Every ‘validated wish’ will receive a response. Every ‘unvalidated wish’ will not.

We vary from *Santa* in one key respect. We do not offer to respond to every wish received. We offer to select 3 particularly deserving wishes and to respond to those within 6 months of receipt. The remainder of wishes will be given serious attention, however, and, in direct negotiation with *Santa* proper, we shall co-ordinate and contribute to eventual delivery of all other validated wishes expressed to us.

Don’t worry unduly if you miss the deadline: next year is a new year and you can write to Santa then. – Though we’re the Baboushka end of Santa’s work so our style is Moscow-Mayhem, lol – but we nonetheless clean our act up in time to be efficient in delivering joy to all we find ourselves among – so worry not. We think *Santa* will be proud of us and begin to pick up on the equality of women and men. MissionMiraculus has been the energy of a woman and of feminine energy sourcing.

gifts grow on trees

Here are the methods of responding to this Christmas Wishes Competition:-

Get writing!! You’ve got until the 24 th December – be sure to let us have the details of your wish, your name, contact details and your delivery address 😉 We also need to know your age range – for example, we need to know where you are in your childhood- 0-10; 11-16; 17-30; 31-70; 71-100 etc. All over 100 are registered as ‘adults’.

At the weekend we will be producing a christmas edition of this site’s home page.

There will be an announcement regarding the sliding in of our commercial site around the til-now personal blog, which will be renamed once this transit takes place.

Charles Harrison: he inspired Janie

The new home page will be more like a magazine front page + contents page in format, with basic information there to inform visitors about different choices and options of content across the site. Parts of it will be based on private subscription and there will be a ‘shop’ option. However there will be publically available content too.

As did her dad

The date of transition is planned as 6th January 2014. It may be moved to 11th of January to coincide with the official launch of MissionMiraculus Ltd. This event will take place at the Malt House in Birmingham. and will be strictly invitation only. A public launch will follow date & venue tba.

Leamington Road2Recovery Show, June, 2010

Janie has been in London this week and mid-month she’s heading for Leeds & Keighley, to attend an awards ceremony and visit friends, before returning to North London to spend Christmas with her family.

family love

She’ll be nipping back home to oversee the work being done to the front of her house on the way though, and hopes to catch up with a few friends then, and maybe even have an extremely small party, with food and music, to which she invites no-one at all but herself!! 😉

NB ALL NAMES IN THIS OR ANY OTHER ENTRY ON THIS SITE ARE INNOCENT OF ANY CONTENTS HEREIN. GLORY SHOULD BE DIRECTED TOWARD THEM, ANY RAGE PLEASE SEND MY WAY (VIRTUALLY ONLY. IF YOU HAVE ANY PHYSICALLY ENRAGED REACTIONS PLEASE SIT QUIETLY IN YOUR BEDROOM TIL IT PASSES. A VALIUM MIGHT HELP.)

Yes: after a detour into the world of F(ine)Art, its heroes and demons, we return to the sunny climes of the Midlands, focus on the University of Birmingham (though I’ve never actually run a group in or at the clock itself it remains a handy focal point) and the topic of ‘Mental Distress’.I say ‘Mental Distress’ in preference to the normative heading of ‘Mental Health’… After all – does one go to work in a department titled ‘Blood Health’ when one is researching causes of Diabetes? Wouldn’t that be kind of… weird….?

Or would it? In fact maybe such projects SHOULD be called ‘Blood Health’ to assist the focus into how to bring bodies into alignment with healthful balance? I suspect that with Diabetes there are some unsurprising ‘discoveries’ in that direction, though not in the official language, which remains driven by DISease and INbalance and ILL health.

Be that as it may, I am primarily addressing the delightful students I met yesterday and today in one of the science blocks, working with Maureen Smojkis in delivering learning around families and solutions focussed approaches within Social Work practice.

Those of you who have seen us working together know that we have developed our act over the last three or four years (or more) and have now got to the stage where we accidentally lead the way in adult (and child) learning, since we are a ‘force to be reckoned with’…. we don’t talk at people, if we can manage it we don’t talk too much at all; when we do talk Maureen is the straight guy, I am the fall guy and everyone ends up having the minimum of a chuckle.

Is this naughty I hear you asking… Is this something the chancellor in his huge office; his vast piles of paperwork; his ambiance set, doubtless, by paintings, portraits of ex-chancellors etc, and luxury wallpapers with a vast and imposing work table (better known as an executive desk); with his secretary in her own outer office gatekeeping on his behalf and a further office of administrators busily ensuring that the central core of the university is all run according to ‘high academic and social standards’, ‘appropriate protocols’ and ‘unwritten rules’ – would be likely to welcome or abhor?

I couldn’t tell you. I’ve never had a tete a tete with the Chancellor of the University of Birmingham, although I’d love to have a coffee and chat with him, for some reason best known only to himself, he’s never rung to invite me.

To be utterly frank, I think I do know the answer to this mystery. It’s less a mystery than an entirely predictable state of affairs. He has never heard of me. He doesn’t know my name; he doesn’t know I work at the University; he doesn’t know what I look like, sound like, or teach like. He doesn’t know my history, my ‘track record’ or my ambitions. He doesn’t know my age, my gender or my height.

I tend to doubt that I am a detail he has ever needed to take any cognizance of.

I may leave it like that.

Then again…. I may alter that… it depends on what I find out about him. So far nothing. He could be a her or a pekingese dog for all I know, though to be fair if he proves to be a small dog I shall be asking serious questions – like – who put him in there? does anyone take him out for poos? does anyone make sure he doesn’t wee on the paperwork – it may sound unlikely, but my benjii frequently sits on a kitchen chair before I get home so I can admire how humanoid he’s becoming…

And – if the top dog of the University of Birmingham is reading this now and is thinking ‘what a delightful person this appears to be, I must contact him/her and invite h for a coffee: please don’t act yet. I need to find out what kind of animal you are first.

Anyhoo… I’ve written this in the hope that the students: Alix, Paul, Dave, Lucy, (I’m running out of remembered names guys, sorry), will get onto this blog and get commenting and opening conversations.. I’m so keen to shift this ‘blog’ from a ‘broadcast’ to a ‘conversation’ (albeit with me having the editor’s pen in my hand at all times and pushing out long monologues when the fancy takes me) –

And I ‘should’ write tons more ‘scintillating’ and ‘profound’ text to send you to sleep with…but I’m almost asleep already…so….

I wrote the title of this entry in August. Sarah Attar was the first woman from Saudi Arabia to be permitted to run a race in the Olympics. She ran fully covered from head to foot, with only her face and hands on view unveiled.

She finished her 800 metre race almost a full lap behind her competitors yet crossed the line to a standing ovation and with a smile to light up the city of London.

For one brief moment we witnessed the beauty of humanity applauding effort over achievement, challenge over facility, obstacle over determination. In that act we simultaneously celebrated the true nature of all of these ‘normal’ values: it is through effort that we achieve, through challenge that we develop facilities and through determination that we overcome obstacles.

Sarah has already broken through astounding obstacles and challenges by arriving in England to run for her country. She may have been ‘slow’ for the Olympic Championship once she got here – but of course, even once here she was disabled by her difference of outfit as well as her disability of culture at home. I doubt she found herself well accompanied in Saudi Arabia to match the conditions she would discover in England with women world wide having already competed severally with their opponents.

It is a heroic story within the disability movement. Her disability has been cultural. She has now broken through a ceiling for her culture and we can’t do anything but smile with her – for no-one else in the championships went so far this year: In four years time we should see more women having trickled out of this opening.

Of course – there could be questions. For example – the entire obsession with competition, with establishing who runs fastest, who throws furthest, who is cleverest etc., etc., etc., – isn’t this an agenda set by men for men and infiltrated by women who can’t help feeling left out by the games men play?

This is a tough question for me. Mainly because I’m crap at competitive games. So, I stopped being interested in winning competitions shortly before I became able to think at all. I arrived in language freshly shorn of competitive ambitions.

Would that be my ‘femininity’ or simply my inclination to fail that pushed me in this way?

Competition is a difficult concept. It yields its greatest loading in politics as the arena of ‘possessive individualism’ (CB MCPherson, subtitle ‘from Hobbes to Locke’ if you’re interested); the American Dream, the shop-keeper’s daughter etc etc.

If ‘man’ stands for ‘competition’ – couldn’t ‘woman’ stand for ‘bonding’/’sharing’? Women could help men (and women who have moved to ‘male values’) to learn how to relax, how to share, how to feel safe, how to feel ok, how to feel that lovability doesn’t lie in trophies of competition – be it financial, status or penis length.

Yes, I know, how bloody radical am I??!!! 😉

But truth is – my joys come from a walk, a drink, an afternoon baking bread (not so different from clay work really), from helping a little friend with her homework, from making people laugh, from going to bed at night feeling that I’ve done one or two things to make one or two people happier.. How many trophies do I need for these achievements? And if I’ve eaten again today – does it matter?

I guess this must be why I’m not ‘rich and famous’ and why I’ve never run a race let alone win one.

I’m happy though.

Does that count at all?

I think Sarah Attar is happy too. Nothing I have said or suggested by way of reflection – detracts from her achievement. Far from it. In a land where women can wear what they like, work where they like and muscle up with the boys if that’s their wish – who on earth am I, or would I be, to oppose or question the right of the saudi arabian women to assert their existence as fully acknowledged and valued human citizens? In such a world women become the avant-garde sector pushing humanisation.

In England I believe that burden falls upon the shoulders of the ‘disability community’. There are a lot of us. If you begin to include the numbers disabled by culture and finance – it runs to many millions. Too many, by far, for David Cameron to hold back.

All it will take is a few determined people to emerge and this movement will transform this country for good.

“What is Recovery?
In our research, we differentiate between personal recovery and clinical recovery in the context of mental illness. Personal recovery is an understanding that has emerged from people who have personal experience of recovery in, with and from mental illness. Many definitions of recovery have been proposed by those who are experiencing it:

By contrast, clinical recovery is an understanding that has emerged from professional-led research and practice, and involves ‘getting back to normal’ – being symptom-free, in employment or education, living independently, having friends, etc. Our research focus is on personal recovery, not clinical recovery. On this web-site we use the term ‘recovery’ as a shorthand for personal recovery.”

Please note the above, published on the website Researching for Recovery, as a vehicle of the ‘Institute of Psychiatry at the Maudslay’

Is it just us or is this the use of power to keep the reins of power? We wonder how much money the Institute of Psychiatry receives to professionalise and disempower ‘experts by experience’ in the field of mental distress? This is merely our interpretation, of course, and I guess once again – it won’t do our career interests a lot of good… Story of our life

Well, not all of you… a few of you, 215, have visited Tim Minchin youtube uploads on this blog today and a lot, lot of you visited yesterday. But then, I know that a lot, lot of you check us out on a Friday, some at work, some over tea, some instead of going out, or either side of that.

So I also know that you haven’t been as excited on Friday as you had got last Thursday.

Tim Minchin ROCKS!!! Jesus-Neo-Punk man – this guy deserves an even bigger place on the World’s global stage of glory than he has yet had – take the guy to the TOP!!

So come on – move it and watch these videos if you haven’t before. I’m busy writing, snail method, a properly articulated and usable theory of mind and mental distress plus diagnostics and treatment suggestions Drugs aren’t a part of the plan. Not western medicine poisons anyway.

It will be measurable and testable. It will not include the word ‘illness’ apart from a discussion about the etymology of that word.

My objections to applying the word ‘ill’ to human beings or animals or anything else outside of simple and visible, usually, applications of it is, in our opinion, crass and misguided and judgemental.

Our model will be, as said, testable. It will elaborate a set of hypotheses. It will fill in a lot of the gaps. It will be accompanied by a manual of diagnostics and treatment proposals. Research theses will begin on pilot cases to test this new theory.

It this Theory withstands a rigorous 5 year testing process then I think we can safely say: We have a theory of mind and human distress that will replace Psychiatry and Psychiatrists. Since Western Medicine has nothing to say about human distress. It’s not available at the chemists in any bottle or carton. You can’t cut it out with a knife. You can’t add objects into it.

I guess it’s author will also receive a Nobel Prize for Contributions to Medicine. After all, by its new definitions, human distress is not illness at all. So that’s 25% reduction in costs and statistics of health in this country at the very least and over much of the world in due course.

Since none of the syndromes characteristically fitting the term ‘mental distress’ and ‘disturbance’ are ‘life long’. They may be severe at presentation; they may be life threatening at presentation and get more delicate before healing – but every one is healable and no one is excluded from this hopeful hypothesis.

The entire theory will be published in parts on this blog or a related blog. It will have a home page that will be public and free and an archives and members only section for fee payers.

On wwwsilencelol.wordpress.com you now have endless hours of pleasure watching a range of short films made by the MissionMiraculus Entertainments Team.

They are based on the MM party that took place last Saturday night and that included Arrabbella Faith as a guest; on the difficulties I ran into on Monday when a car tyre slash + a hormone riot + a hard day at the unit for the man who was going to mend my car… Plus some reflections on Love that I’ve actually got subtitles for (right term? not sure..)

(Thanks to flip share camcorder software – Flip Share rocks!!!)

I hooe you have a great weekend. I shall be starting early, working tomorrow, car at the garage, then home for a bath before I dress up for social fun and then stay in pointlessly lol 😉

Competition 1.Entrants are invited to think of a ‘catch phrase’ for one, other or both of the blogs :

http://www.silencelol.wordpress.com and http://www.talkheals.wordpress.com.
Three top prizes will be awarded to the winners of this prize: 1. The winner of the catchphrase award for silencelol.wordpress 2. The winner of the catchphrase award for the talkheals.wordpress 3. The winner of the catchphrase award for the amalgam blogs, incorporating an excellent marketing grasp of the power of the two together.

First prize for 1 and 2 will be £500. First prize for 3 will be £1000.

The catchphrases will be used for the year of 2012 on the blog and will be credited to the author of it.

There will be an award for each interesting and memorable entry into this competition. Intellectuals from a range of strands should find plenty to get their teeth into; Anti-Intellectuals can have a field day with option J.

The winning prize for this competition will be £1500 plus an invitation to join the board at MissionMiraculus as either an honorary member or an executive member at their own choosing. They will collect a 5% share of MM’s 2012 profits.

Get marketing you writers – this blog will make as much money as you provide it via your visits and recommendations. The more you engage, the richer it will get and the greater your stake in the company: MissionMiraculus!!! 😉

The end of entry date is not yet decided. Entries to be sent to the address as advertised yesterday and please ensure the fees are paid. £2.50 for Competition One, £4.50 for Competition 2.

Looking Forward to hearing from you. Let’s put the end of date at 31st March. CUT OFF DATE 31ST MARCH 2012. PRESENTATION OF AWARDS LATE APRIL 2012.